Q 01/05

What did Peter the Great tax from 1698 to push Russian men toward Western European fashion?

A) Wigs

B) Kaftans

C) Beards

D) Fur hats

Answer · why

C) Beards

Beards could stay only if the wearer paid, and he had to carry a copper or silver token showing a nose, mouth and whiskers as his receipt.

Q 02/05

Which territory did Tsar Alexander II's government sell in 1867 for $7.2 million, about two cents an acre?

A) Alaska

B) Sakhalin

C) Kamchatka

D) Manchuria

Answer · why

A) Alaska

Alaska, then known as Russian America, went to the United States in a deal negotiated by Secretary of State William Seward and the Russian diplomat Ed...

Q 03/05

Only two empires in history covered more land than the Russian Empire: the British Empire and which other?

A) Roman

B) Mongol

C) Spanish

D) Persian

Answer · why

B) Mongol

Mongol and British rule alone outstripped the tsars' realm, which at its height covered about 22.8 million square kilometres, roughly one-sixth of the...

Q 04/05

Which peasant mystic and faith healer gained sway over Russia's last imperial family before nobles murdered him in 1916?

A) Georgy Gapon

B) John of Kronstadt

C) Grigori Rasputin

D) Sergei Nilus

Answer · why

C) Grigori Rasputin

Grigori Rasputin won the imperial couple's trust as a healer for their ailing only son, and his growing hold over the empress turned conservative nobl...

Q 05/05

Which jeweller's workshop made 50 jewelled Easter eggs for the last two Russian tsars between 1885 and 1917?

A) Fabergé

B) Cartier

C) Tiffany

D) Boucheron

Answer · why

A) Fabergé

Fabergé delivered the first in 1885: a plain white enamel shell that opened to reveal a golden yolk, and inside that a golden hen.